The Uttar Pradesh Investors Summit, 2018, successfully showcased the state as an investment friendly destination. It was here that the Government announced the Innovation and Start-up policy, for which the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, Shri Yogi Adityanath announced a corpus of Rs. 1,000 crores to promote start-ups and entrepreneurial ventures.
In a progressive step towards fulfilling this mandate, the Government of Uttar Pradesh (GoUP) joined hands with the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FICCI) and organised a Roundtable Discussion on Disruptive Innovations, Start-ups and Entrepreneurship on Monday.
To concretise the policy, the event was attended by Mr. Sanjiv Saran, Additional Chief Secretary, IT & Electronics, Government of Uttar Pradesh, who announced the UP Government’s aim of building the largest incubator in the country. He further detailed the Govt. of UP’s plan of 7 new software technology parks, equipped with mentors and mentees. For this, the Govt of UP has tied up with centres of excellences such as IIT Kanpur, IIM Lucknow, IT hubs and FICCI.
Through this step, the Government’s objective is to enable the incubators to identify and nurture disruptive technologies that can be used for the benefit of the State and scaling up the existing talent mine.
Mr. Nirankar Saxena, Deputy Secretary General, FICCI, elaborated the crucial role of FICCI in this endeavour, of bringing in its global network and expertise in scaling up, promoting and commercializing the start-ups both in domestic and international market. He also articulated that, through this partnership between FICCI and the GoUP, 10,000 new jobs can be created every year with 80 % focus on rural population and increasing farmers’ income.
There is enormous potential in sectors such as Agriculture, Healthcare & Handicraft that can be tapped to accelerate small & medium enterprises and low-income groups to create sustainable means of livelihood in the state.
The Roundtable was an initiative which brought together more than 50 disruptive start-ups from the state of Uttar Pradesh and well-known industry mentors such as Shri Yogesh Andlay, Co-founder, Nucleus Software and Polaris Financial Technology & Member, FICCI Tech Board; Dr Nikhil Agarwal, Former CEO, Innovation Society, Govt. of Andhra Pradesh and Founder, Entrepreneur Café & Member FICCI Tech Board; Ms Padmaja Ruparel, President Indian Angel Network. The event also saw a significant turnout from dignitaries who are enablers of an innovation ecosystem in the country such as Dr Rajiv Sharma, Secretary, Science & Engineering Research Board (SERB); Mr Anil Sinha, Advisor, Global Impact Investors Network & Former head at IFC, World Bank Group and Mr. P K Kapur, Former Indian Ambassador to Chile.
It proved to be an effective forum where the start-ups could engage in a meaningful dialogue with Government and industry representatives on initiatives they need for a more robust ecosystem, the roadblocks and possible solutions. Shri Saran and all present welcomed this discussion as a step towards creating a world class start-up and entrepreneurship ecosystem in the state. Noting the feedback from the Roundtable, Shri Saran also revealed some of the forward-looking policies and work underway in the state of UP to ensure ease of doing business and transparency, such as easier communication with industries through the UP(Uttar Pradesh) online portal, the digitisation of tendering and gram panchayats.
The event provided a platform for all stakeholders - start-ups with disruptive technology, the State, investors, domain experts to work together to address and influence policy decisions to further the cause of innovation and entrepreneurship. It also proved to be a clarion call by the Government of Uttar Pradesh and its intent to build the personnel and infrastructure to foster an environmentof innovation excellence in entrepreneurship & technology development in India.